Up Up And Away

With Memorial 2 outta the way, a brief respite descends. Brief because...oh who am I kidding there's no fucking respite. This week is moot full dress (I dun even know the exact date) and next Saturday is the actual one. I am woefully unprepared. Am terrified at the prospect of being up there, the final mooter of the entire day, stammering and stuttering and urms and ahs.

And then of course on the 11th - disaster. And come end of April / early May = even bigger disaster. So I'm not likely to update much till after. Ah, after.

I wish everyone will make up their minds quickly so I can book my tickets and have something concrete to look forward to.

Defrost

I've never been one to praise JIVE records, but credit must be given where its due - they've been pushing Blackout even though the person who should be doing the promotion has not been doing her job. Hence this official remix of third single Break The Ice with Fabolous, who in my eyes will always be remembered for his contribution to the Get Right remix. This week, Break The Ice entered the top 40 on pop radio, following in the footsteps of its predecessors. While they haven't exactly been radio smashes, Gimme More and Piece of Me have - will, in the case of the latter - sold more than a million digital downloads each in the US. No small feat indeed. Both peaked in the top 20 on the Hot 100, (#3 and #18 respectively) and in the top 3 in the UK (#3 and #2). When you consider the promotion that's actually been done (the horrible VMA performance, the boring GM video, and little else bar the PoM video which was barely good), this is actually pretty good. Now if only more people will pick up the parent album.

Break The Ice started off slowly, taking over a month from the time it picked up airplay to enter the top 40 on CHR Pop, but over the past week (ironically, following the release of the OFFICIAL ANIME VIDEO, which I'm sure most of you have seen), its been picking up steam on airplay and sales and this remix may just be what is needed to push the song further up the charts. And of course, Britney's guest-starring on 'How I Met Your Mother' next Monday, which isn't exactly promotion for the song but is certain to get attention and is a step in the right direction. I don't want to jinx anything at this point...but maybe rock bottom's finally been hit.

Things have been quiet on the Britney front recently. Relatively speaking. Which is actually great.

Things have been quiet on my front too no?

Another aborted attempt to hit the gym tonight. I had a mild headache and decided, sometime between school and Bugis, that I wanted desert instead. So Jin took me to Menotti's and we had the most delectable desert ever. Ice cream and warm chocolate cake. Can die.

Sitting outside in the cool air, in a place so familiar yet alien (at that time of night), I almost felt...content. For that fleeting moment. Good food, good company, good conversation...

We talked. Or rather I talked. Tried to verbalize what I've been feeling the past few weeks and it finally crystalized today. And it felt so much better when I finally did hear myself saying it. It went something along the lines of, 'I don't want to become a gap-filler'. Yeah. That's rich isn't it? You'd think I'd have gotten used to being single by now... it's more or less the only status I've known all my life... but even after the bad experiences, even after 6 seasons of SATC (CANNOT WAIT FOR MAY BTW), it still stings, especially when people around you move on.

Earlier today in school, I was prodding Jin to tell me why a lot of people initially react differently to me than they do to him. I have a number of theories spinning in my head but listing them out here is just going to, well, make people even less keen on getting to know me. But let's do it for kicks (and to give you guys an idea of how much Jin suffers).

1) I am ugly. People don't want to get to know ugly people. I sure as hell wouldn't want to.
2) People find me mind-numbingly boring. A personality vacuum is never an appliance the reasonable person wants to own.
3) I am socially retarded (ooh I am in esteemed company here) and am unable to connect and click with most people.

Points to ponder no? Anyway, CONtract is calling. Emphasis is intended.

Not Dead, Barely Alive

I would like to apologise for all the whiny posts below. I realise that I'm not the only one who's busy and has to balance the many facets of undergraduate life... The past month's had some good moments, and I present you all with some of them...
Lisa's big 2-0 at Hotel 1929. Law peeps present

I especially love these two

Not quite Leibovitz but quite nice la

At the airport to see off Weiren... one of the casualties of my tight schedule... he was back for nearly 3 months and I must have met him like, under 10 times
This was taken on the I-Phone btw. How's the quality ah. 2 MP vis-a-vis the others above which are on the allegedly 7.2 Casio

Next up, last Friday's screening at Sinema Old School

Selected Law School people and FISHBALL.

Fucking 15 dollar Turkish desert which I had with Tong and Gerald (we each had one la) at Suntec on Sat. Some wheat/cheese in creamy gravy with tea thing. Quite nice.


Finally, on Sunday, some orchestra thinggy at the Botanics. Wasn't really in the mood (and had all life sucked out of me by personality vacuum) but it was lovely to see so many families gathered and enjoying their Sunday on the gentle verdant slope.


And that's it for now. My life is in somewhat of a mess, not just in terms of pressure from school... more like in general. But I'm going to sort all of it out once Sem 2 is over and I have space to reflect. Life is just whizzing by and at this point, all I can do is live day-to-day, quite literally.

I've not been a good friend, for a variety of reasons. And I should try to do something about it. 1) Keep in touch with people. 2) Not let personal emotions get in way of sharing in the happiness of others.

Ah I can hear it now,

'Don't explain yourself cause talk is cheap, there's more important things than hearing you speak...'

Sorry.

Insomnia

I wish I suffered from insomnia. So I wouldn't have to waste time sleeping. I suffer from the opposite of insomnia really - a constant need to sleep. Let's call it Jinitis. It's damn bad.

If I didn't need sleep, and didn't feel tired, then I just might be able to accomplish everything I need to and still have time for a life. Or maybe I just need to quit going online so bloody much.

But I suppose writing is a worthy pursuit.

Anyway, this week was fairly fruitful. I got some work done, tied up some orientation business (I've said it repeatedly and I'll say it again, the view from the 58th floor of the UOB Plaza is amazing), went for pageant rehearsal (the whole dancing thing is really not working, as ZX said, 'it's horrible'), managed to catch up on sleep (cue desire for insomnia) and watch PS I Love You and Michael Clayton, which is great. Also had Carl's Junior 2 days apart, which is guilt-trip and fat-laden delicious and disgusting at the same time. Gym. Wandering bookstores. Starbucks. Nice, pointless things like that. Oh and of course our dinner at Chomp Chomp which was great, and my JC class reunion - fun. Ok, so my week didn't suck as much as I thought it did. Ho hum.

I caught Damages on AXN, this legal drama starring Glen Close. I'm getting one of those legal drama highs again. Not since the days of Ally McBeal the The Practice in the early 00s, which are scarily almost over. I was watching VH 1's 100 best songs of the '80s on MTV just now (so maybe that's where all my time has been going) and was thinking, my god, soon we'll be able to have a best songs of the 00s!

Can't wait to see where Britney lands on one of those. I'd say the top candidates at this point are Toxic and Oops. Although Slave should really be up there too.

There was this scene in Michael Clayton, where a reporter asked Tilda Swindon's character (who is counsel for some big agricultural conglomerate) how she achieved a work-life balance, and all she could manage, after much thinking, was 'when you enjoy your work, when you love what you do, that's the balance right there!' And I took it so personally for some reason.